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misscaryl
| Pan Female, 49, San Diego, California
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The Orientation and interest choices I made are not accurate as this site does not give options appropriate for most. If you want to know who I am and what I'm about, conversation is a great way to find out.
Not seeking a relationship online I'm aka: drkdesyre here, just wanted my name as ID
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5/2/2011 8:02:36 PM: My apologies for causing offense, genuineuksub .. glad you have the block working
10/27/2010 12:53:25 PM: Nov 6 play party in San Diego! All genders and orientations, preceded by Stapling workshop at 5:30. Email info@clubxsd.org for info
12/30/2009 3:33:18 PM:
I must repost this essay from Patti at - it's long but I found it well worth the read:Not all BDSM is dominance and submissionIn
a recent discussion on a completely different topic, a sub-thread
popped up on a subject that's near and dear to my heart. I thought it
deserved a thread of its own, so I'm starting one.
Here are some quotes from the original discussion. Please don't be
offended if I've included your quote here. I do it merely for purposes
of illustration, and with no degree of ill will or malice.
My initial idea was/is to try bottoming [...] At this
point, however, I am re-considering that notion. I have ZERO interest
in subbing/servitude
Bottoming" implies submitting
All bottoming is, FOR THAT MOMENT, submitting. Submission is more
than bottoming, true. Bottoming is being THE submissive for that scene.
Period.
I can see how, if a person (normally a dominant in our usage) wanted
masochism, an endorphine thrill, they could have their
boy/girl/bottom/submissive/slave/SO, whatever, or anyone else, spank
them... thus 'topping from the bottom'... 'legitimately', LOL, but it
is still 'submitting' to the spanking, the ACT, and that is the
absolute to which I refer. A person ON 'the bottom' 'submits', to it OR
'Tops from the bottom' in some degree.
I see the key fetish in BDSM, the one that ties us all together as being the power exchange
Without a power exchange dynamic, it is just kinky sex. It is the need to -have- or -give up- power that sets us apart.
From where I sit, each and every one of those things is false.
The term BDSM is a big umbrella. It covers a lot of activities that
used to be addressed with their own acronyms-- Bondage and Discipline
(e.g. Harmony softcore bondage magazines), Dominance and Submission
(playing with power exchange and power dynamics), and Sadism and
Masochism (playing with pain and sensation.) You can also overlay Slave
and Master onto the SM, or just take the B for bondage without the D.
The term also wraps itself around lots of things that don't really fit
into the alphabet soup, such as human animal play, some fetishism, some
body modification, self-bondage, ageplay, and quite a few other things.
It's really pretty much a catch-all term for a big chunk of alternative
eroticism.
It's entirely possible to do BDSM play without any sort of
dominance, submission, or power exchange being involved. It's quite
possible to mix dominance and submission with pretty much any BDSM
activity, of course, but doing so is far from mandatory. While many
people do choose to do power exchange as part of BDSM, there are plenty
of people in the scene who do not do so and the people who do play with
power don't do it in all of their scenes. Their way of playing is just
as valid as any other, and they are equal participants and members of
the community.
When I first came into the leather community a couple of decades
ago, the words top and bottom were the catch-all terms for giver and
receiver, or what a friend of mine referred to as pitcher and catcher.
This seemed to work really well, as they fairly clearly described the
roles without ascribing any particular motivations or orientations to
the participants. Over the years, and for reasons that I won't
elaborate on here, the catch-all terms became dom and sub. This is an
unfortunate linguistic shift, as it now colors the participants in any
scene with roles and motivations that may not actually exist.
It's even more unfortunate, as it suggests that all of BDSM involves
dominance and submission. It leads people to believe that all bottoms
are submissive and all tops dominant, and that in order to be a
top/bottom one must also be dominant/submissive. This does a terrible
disservice to people who are interested in some aspects of BDSM play
but have no particular affinity for power exchange, as it leads them to
try to assume roles that do not fit. This can be awkward, annoying, or
even damaging to the player who is not oriented toward power exchange,
but feels that they must pretend to be in order to be a part of the
BDSM community. It is especially dangerous for newcomers who lack the
experience to see the full rainbow of BDSM diversity.
We all tend to view the world through the lens of our personal
experience. If I see a flogging scene in the dungeon, I will generally
perceive it as an SM scene. If a DS-centric person sees the same scene,
they will probably perceive it as a scene involving power exchange.
From the outside, it may be difficult or impossible to tell whether
there is a power dynamic going on, but if you think of BDSM primarily
as power exchange you will probably see dominance and submission even
where none exists.
The belief that all BDSM is DS is my hot button, and I have made it
my personal crusade to correct this misconception whenever I encounter
it. People often ask me why I care so much, or why I feel so strongly
about this. That's easy. When I first came into the community, I was
around people who believed that DS was an integral part of what we did.
I was drawn to bottoming, and I wanted to experience the intensity of
spanking, whipping, and other SM play. My desire was very strong, and I
was willing to do what I had to in order to fulfill my needs.
Unfortunately, much of what I had to do involved shoehorning myself
into a submissive role for which I was ill-suited, and I was profoundly
unhappy doing so. I spent quite a bit of time suffering through this
unhappiness in an attempt to find what I needed, and more than once I
was on the edge of leaving the community in frustration.
I eventually met up with a merry band of sadomasochists who showed
me what I was missing, and taught me that I could be myself and find
what I needed without having to fake something that was contrary to my
nature. I learned that top and bottom could be collaborators and
co-conspirators who met as equals in the dungeon and shared equally in
the journey.
The misconception that all BDSM involves dominance and submission
made me extremely miserable, and I wish that I had learned earlier that
I could be myself and still find what I needed. I speak up on this
topic because I don't want anyone else to go through the same agony
that I did-- I'd much rather have them find the joyful agony that they
seek. While some people may perceive my arguments as linguistic
hair-splitting, for me it's an educational mission of truth and
happiness. If just one person reads my discussions and learns that they
don't have to pretend to be dominant or submissive, it will have been
worth it to me.
Over the years, I've had a surprising number of people tell me that
I'm wrong, and that what I'm doing really does involve dominance and
submission. If you'd like to well and truly infuriate me, I highly
recommend this technique. Nobody but me is inside my head, and nobody
is closer to my thoughts and emotions than I am. When you tell me that
what I'm doing is DS, you undermine and invalidate my entire experience
of BDSM. It's almost certain that the flavor of BDSM you do is
different from the flavor of BDSM that I do, but I would never deign to
judge your play or question your truth. Yet, for some reason, DS
practitioners often feel the need to do that to non-DS players. The
arrogance of this is truly stunning.
There are an infinite number of ways to do BDSM. None of them is
deeper, kinkier, more evolved, or otherwise superior to any other way
of doing BDSM. There's no hierarchy of kink, no grade levels, no
leather evolutionary path. There are just different flavors of BDSM,
each custom-tailored to the individuals involved.
Not all BDSM involves bondage, and that's OK. Not all BDSM involves
sadism and masochism, and that's OK. Finally, not all BDSM involves
dominance and submission. That, too, is OK. Well, it's more than OK--
if egalitarian BDSM play is your kink, it can be truly glorious.
12/13/2009 11:49:03 PM: Clue #14: If you send someone a message and then block them before they can reply, you're not dominant. you're a spineless wimp. It's simple really.
12/13/2009 3:17:54 PM: Random thought: Why does the collarme TOS cap the word "You" in the middle of sentences? Are we all collarme's doms?
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